Virginia, coming off a bye week, is a little less a M*A*S*H unit heading into game week with #10 North Carolina than it had been the past few weeks.
The player-availability issues are mainly on the defensive side, with linebacker Josh Ahern out with a broken thumb, defensive back Dre Walker still a couple of weeks away after suffering a knee injury in the loss at Boston College back in Week 5, and safety Lex Long deciding on season-ending foot surgery.
“It was the right thing to do,” coach Tony Elliott said of Long, who rehabbed for weeks and actually made it back to the practice field, for a day.
“It didn’t quite feel the way that he thought it would after the rest, so, sent him to a couple of more specialists to look at the foot, so he has decided to have surgery on it. That was the best thing,” Elliott said.
Long had 10 tackles in the season-opening 49-13 loss to Tennessee in Nashville. He missed the Week 2 loss to JMU, then was back out for Week 3 at Maryland, but left after getting just six snaps.
Long was a valuable guy in 2022, getting 381 snaps, recording 43 tackles and allowing 17 catches on 25 pass targets.
Elliott expects to get cornerback Malcolm Greene back this week. The Clemson transfer has logged 155 snaps at cornerback in 2023, earning a career-low 52.0 grade to this point from Pro Football Focus, with eight tackles and seven receptions allowed on 11 targets and a 137.5 NFL passer rating against.
Also returning from an early-season injury for the UNC game is defensive end Paul Akere, who went out after three snaps in the loss up at Maryland.
Akere has only been on the field for 51 snaps in 2023, but he has a nice 70.1 PFF grade, with three QB pressures on 32 pass-rush snaps.
A year ago, Akere earned a 65.7 PFF grade for his work in his 250 snaps, with five sacks and 23 total QB pressures on 134 pass-rush snaps.
Ahern, a linebacker with a 66.8 PFF grade on his 147 snaps in 2023, broke his thumb in the Week 6 win over William & Mary on Oct. 7.
He had surgery on the thumb during the bye, and his return is basically an issue with pain tolerance over the next couple of weeks.
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Chris Graham
